Svéd Gyermekkönyvtári Intézet

The foundation Svenska barnboksinstitutet, SBI (The Swedish Institute for Children's Books), is a special library open to the public and an information centre for children's and young people's literature. The aim is to promote this kind of literature in Sweden as well as Swedish children's and young people's literature abroad. The charter is dated December 7, 1965 and operations commenced in 1967. From July, 1, 1989, the Institute has had the Royal Library as a supervisory authority. The board is made up of representatives from all the founders (Univ. of Stockholm, The Swedish Publishers' Association, Swedish Writers' Union,The City of Stockholm, The Swedish Association of Illustrators) and the chairman is appointed by the Government. At present approximately 60,000 catalogued volumes covers children's and young people's books published in Sweden i.e. both Swedish originals and books translated into Swedish. The collection also includes books published in Sweden in languages other than Swedish and, to a certain extent, the works of Swedish authors translated to other languages. The collection is complete from 1967, and relatively complete for the whole of this century. During the 1980s the Institute received three major book donations which increased the pre-1900 collections considerably. Additions are continually being made, primarily through gifts from private individuals and institutions. Textbooks and songbooks are selectively included in the collections, as other institutions cover these particular areas. Comic albums are collected although not periodically published comic magazines. A number of catalogues cover the publication of children's books. From the year of publication 1956 all children's and young adult books are catalogued in the database ELSA. Children's books before 1956 can only be found in card catalogues